Senate The US Politics discussion

if you took a core sample of the administration it would be layer upon layer of incompetence, all the way down.

 

As I predicted this morning, a Republican has called for a select committee. It's John McCain, which isn't too big a surprise in itself.

https://twitter.com/NBCNightlyNews/status/844675811974103041

 

Question now is how much backpeddaling Nunes and the GOP do.

 

One of the founders of the Justice Democrats responded to an NBC News hit piece on them yesterday:



Here’s the original hit piece: http://nbcnews.to/2nCHjXA

 

It is the one trait that brings all of them together.

 

None, I predict. Trump's supporters don't care and as long as he has the support of his supporters, the GOP isn't going to turn on him.

 

He's already started to lose his supporters:

 

Yeah, they might care when he starts to cut their programs since he championed himself as someone who would help the working class. But they don't care about this Russian stuff. I'm betting even if overwhelming evidence came out that he colluded with Russia to help him win the election most of his supporters wouldn't care because FOX news and Brietbart would spin it as something positive or deflect that the real story is the leaks.

Trump has about a 90% approval rating with Republicans now, way higher than most of the members of Congress. Congress isn't going to touch him while he has that kind of support, no matter how bad this Russia stuff gets.

 

I agree that his voters don’t care about Russian interference in the 2016 elections, but the fact is that we have seen a dip in the presidential approval rating (he’s currently at 37% according to Gallup). I believe that it’ll only get worse from here, and I believe that Congressional Republicans will use this to impeach him once they decide that they have no desire to attach themselves to his sinking ship…and once they’ve used him to pass all the horrible legislation that they’ve spent decades salivating for. Remember that the GOP establishment never liked Trump, and I guarantee that they’d much rather have Mike Pence as President. The other advantage is that they’ll then be able to blame all the massively unpopular legislation they’ve always wanted on the Monster Donald Trump without ever taking any responsibility for it…just as they washed their hands of the wildly unpopular Troubled Asset Relief Program (which they overwhelmingly voted in favor of), and blamed it all on George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Therefore, it’s a win-win for them.

 

I disagree. The midterms are steadily approaching. I know they seem distant now, but it won't be long before we're less than a year and a half away. Before we know it, we'll hit the 12 month point. The president's approval rating is a critical indicator of midterm success or failure, and if Trump's is in the low 30s, it will be catastrophic for Republicans throughout the country.

 

This was from a CNN poll in early March, and we have more fishy stuff about this whole thing come out since then. Republicans in congress are eventually going to realize that they can't keep ignoring this and get on board for a special prosecutor/independent committee.

Yeah, Trump's numbers are already in 2006 Bush territory and look how that turned out for the GOP. And also keep in mind that the group that votes the most in the mid-term elections are college educated whites, and that is the group Trump is losing the most ground on (and he started from a low point with them already).

If this doesn't change, this isn't going to end well for the GOP in next year's mid-terms.

 

Let's hope so. I'm just not sure he can ever get to the low 30s mark, he wasn't joking when he said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose a single supporter. He attracts some kind of fanatic cult base that I haven't seen before. Plus, FOX news is basically acting like state propaganda in trying to dismiss this whole Russian thing as fake news and the real focus is on the leaks.

Let's just say Nunes continuously ignoring evidence of potential treason and focusing all his time on the leaks at the hearing on Monday doesn't give me much confidence the GOP will eventually do the right thing.

 

A special prosecutor/independent committee selected by whom exactly?

Not going to hold my breath for an impartial party here.

 

I am not sure how the committee would work, but for prosecutor it would come from the Deputy AG, since Sessions recused himself.

 

At this point, I think it's generous to assume the man can maintain the low 30s. He may well tie Congress' approval ratings these past few years. By the midterms, assuming this continues- and given the amount of self-inflicted wounds, how could it not? - he'll be lucky not to be in the single digits. The Kochs are now threatening to withold money from any Republican who votes for the healthcare bill. Yes, you read that right. The bill is so bad that the Kochs are trying to kill it. If that bill passes and some form of Trump's budget passes, he will plummet in approval right along with the economy. He's made far more enemies than friends and that enemy list only continues to grow. He can't even shepherd his first bill to pass the House because his credibility is shot. And as a reminder, it's not even 100 days yet! He's only going to continue to spiral. The only question really is whether he makes four years or if he's removed from office. I don't see him resigning. They would need one heck of a smoking gun for him to do that and I don't think they have it yet. They have enough between Russian collusion and blatant ethical violations to go after him for impeachment. Plus that whole serial lying thing. But they won't succeed in removing him from office without the 2/3rd majority and there are not yet enough Republicans with a spine. I think they are damned either way and 2018 is a bloodbath for the House. The Senate though is still likely Republican, which means barring something they can't avoid, Trump stays put even if a Democratic House impeaches him.

 

I disagree. His numbers sank significantly when his supporters found out they MIGHT lose their benefits. Imagine what happens when they DO lose their benefits.

Actually, you’re wrong about the Koch brothers. In fact, the exact opposite is true. They’re opposing it because it’s not draconian enough.

 

Oh, I know the Kochs are still evil. But rather than let it pass and take Pence's offer of Senate amendments to make it more draconian, they also want Trump to fail so they are pushing to kill it now.

 

The emails of Wayne Tracker A.K.A Rex Tillerson, have mysteriously disappeared.

 

It’s undeniably true that the Koch brothers have never liked Donald Trump. However, I think it’s also true that they’re not stupid and they’re willing to exploit him to get what they want for as long as his Presidency lasts. As I’ve said, I believe that their strategy is to let Trump sign all sorts of horrible, massively unpopular legislation into law, and once that’s eroded all his support, they’ll use the Russian interference in the 2016 elections as an excuse to impeach him. That’s certainly the vibe I’ve gotten from Mitch McConnell, and McConnell is pretty damn close to the Koch brothers. Basically, here’s what I’ve been reading:

http://cbsn.ws/2nKNusJ

In other words, their problem with the bill is that it’s too humane. If the Koch brothers have shown one Achilles’ heel, it’s that they get too greedy. When he was President, Barack Obama gave them several budgets that basically gave them 97% of what they wanted, and they would refuse to accept it because they demanded 110%. Ironically, the Koch brothers’ greed probably saved Social Security (I’ve already posted extensively about Obama’s draconian proposal involving the Chained Consumer Price Index).

Moreover, don’t think for a second that they dislike Trump for any legitimate reasons. They dislike Trump because he’s a wild card and they know they can't fully control him. If they believe that Trump has totally gone off the rails and that he’s about to engage in some idiot endeavor that’ll cause significant damage to their business interests (remember that the Koch brothers basically operate a front organization for a bunch of other wealthy donors who wish to remain anonymous), expect the impeachment proceedings to begin immediately.

As much as I think Trump is terrible, I actually think these guys are even worse. I certainly think they’re a greater danger to the Republic…at least in the long term. Trump will eventually be gotten rid of. He’s too stupid to cause any real long-term damage. These guys…they ain’t goin’ anywhere for a long, long time.

 

So the Secretary of State has missing emails...

I'm sure Jason Chaffetz will get right on that. After he finishes with Hillary's of course.

 

My thoughts exactly.

 

Right after they were subpoenaed by a judge.

Hmm...

On another note, I agree with KnightWriter that the midterms may end up being much worse than originally thought for the Republican Party, but I also think it would be a mistake to focus solely on Congressional and Senate races. A lot of grassroots energy has sprung up at the local and state level, which may translate into a major shift next year in terms of who controls state legislatures and governors' mansions. That should be at least an equal (if not superior) focus of the Democrats' efforts--it's the first step to reversing the gerrymandering of the House, and the more states Democrats can win back before 2020, the better positioned the party will be slam the Republicans in the next phase of redistricting.

 

http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Dual-US-Israeli-citizen-behind-most-JCC-bomb-threat-calls-484990



Actually, the question still remains. Is this a liberal trying to frame the alt right? Or a conservative trying to frame Muslims?

 

^Not funny. Sad. And hurts those who wants to push back against both real anti-Semitism and real anti-Islamic behavior.

EDIT: And it looks like Gorsuch will be filibustered. Any bets on how long it takes McConnell to gut the filibuster entirely?

 

They should filibuster Gorsuch as much to slow things down in the Senate as anything else. If McConnell goes nuclear, that's fine. It will be on him, and them. Senate Democrats should slow things to a crawl in the Senate to force Republicans to deal with town halls in mid to late April with the AHCA unresolved.